~ A Chance Happenstance ~

Out in the mart to buy stationery for my kids, I could see myself standing in the queue as a standard practice now a days as part of the social distance phenomenon due the Covid-19 pandemic. Oblivion to the fact that there stood a little girl, all of 10-12 years of her age anticipating her turn to buy a set of pens for herself.

Holding crumbled notes and a coin of Re 5, she voiced “Uncle 25 rupees key pen de do." - The shopkeeper knew her stance as she was a regular acquaintance to the shop. By her aura and dressing sense she stood to be below the lower middle class but her appalling confidence and her oratorical voice was brewing with something coming her way in times to come. Getting her set of pens, she grimaced and looked at all of us with a sense of friendliness.

Quite unexpectedly, she opens the set of pens and asks me "Uncle kya aap ek pen khareedenge?", I was flabbergast as I didn’t expect her to simply do this! In fact many of us standing there were put into questionable stance not comprehending the girls act.

The conversation thus broke out between the little queen and me - " Beta, I thought you had bought these pens for your own self to study, but here you are immediately trying to sell them off- what made you buy them at first instance?"

With a smiling face, she replied - "Uncle, I want only four pens, two i shall keep myself and two for my little brother, the rest of them I would sell and earn money for two copies that I want to write on! “I could really sense the art of salesmanship and a buddying entrepreneur was standing in front of me.I inquired about her background and got to know that she was a class 5 student of a Govt aided school and was going home after doing household chores with her mother. Upon further prodding, she told that I have a knack for studying and would surely want to go to College and be an educated woman!

Her sense of self-esteem made us all felt proud of this little being - Help started to pour in , the pen's bought in a peculiar way - the money was returned to her and the Pen-set was given to her as gift. Seeing this, she jumped with exuberance – “Yeah” as if she was given the gift of her lifetime J. The girl was wished "God Bless" and was thus embraced and made to believe that it is her confidence and self-esteem which would lead her to big destinations in rock-n-roll of providence.

Enquiring with the shopkeeper as to what her story was -" Bhaiya,Iska naam 'Kavita' hai and yeh kaam bhi karti hai and padti bhi hai , padai mein bahut achchi hai, bahut bari humarey yahan se stationery lekar jati hai."

Brimming with self-confidence, the girl crossed the road and went into oblivion of time, but the chance happening became a time-stamp to be remembered and written upon.